


Staring Down With Empty Eyes

by Asrael_Valtiri



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Cock Worship, Confessions, Crying, Grand Marshal Armitage Hux, Insecurity, Kylo Ren is Not Nice, Kylux - Freeform, Loneliness, Lots of Crying, M/M, Past Abuse, Post-TLJ, Supreme Leader Kylo Ren, That's no way to treat your Ginger!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-18
Updated: 2019-08-16
Packaged: 2020-05-14 11:23:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 15,374
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19272289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Asrael_Valtiri/pseuds/Asrael_Valtiri
Summary: Tonight, Hux’s lips roamed over Ren’s body, his hands following. He was a surveyor mapping out a strange, beautiful land no one else had ever seen before.No one else had. Only Hux.





	1. A Violent Truth

**Author's Note:**

> Since this was a very busy month, this chapter, which decided to be difficult, took forever to write. The next chapter will post more promptly. Thank you for reading!

  
  
The moment Ren’s command shuttle arrived back at the Finalizer from Crait, Ren fled. Presumably to be alone, to mope, to destroy something. Anything.

There was something between Ren and the scavenger, Hux could tell. But he didn’t understand; he only knew it involved the thrice-damned Force.

Hux watched his Supreme Leader’s retreating back with a cold glare. One of the officers following him off the shuttle held out a hand to him.

“Sir, may I help you?”

“I’m fine,” Hux replied coldly. He softened his tone and added, “Thank you, though.”

“Sir,” the officer nodded and left him.

Hux knew he had a concussion. He knew his throat was wrecked. He could tell that his ribs were, at the least, quite, quite bruised. Loathe as he was to display any weakness; to show that, yes, indeed, he was vulnerable, his body told him in no uncertain terms that he could not fix it by himself. He managed to walk to Medbay, and if his posture was a bit more stooped than usual, no one noted it. With a grimace, he thought unhappily that the entire ship would hear in a matter of hours of Ren’s abuse on the shuttle.

Hux would have to have words with him.

 

 

**

 

Later that cycle, Ren sat alone in his rooms. Sullen and unwashed, his body hunched in frustration as he tried to find the girl, his skin hot and right. He yelled in futility and flung his gloves across the room. He curled in upon himself and rocked back and forth. It hurt. Everything hurt. He was lost. He was humiliated. He was thrown away once again. His parents had sent him away. His uncle had tried to kill him and then come back years later to humiliate him. He’d killed his master for a girl. That girl had denied him and betrayed him. He thought they’d had a connection, something special he’d never had with anyone else.

Almost anyone else, something in him said. Remember—it began.

“Shut up,” Ren snapped.

Apparently, their bond was false and one-sided. Now, convinced of his singular loneliness, he placed his head upon his knees and wallowed in his misery.

The door chimed.

“Go the fuck away,” he murmured.

It chimed again.

Ren resolutely sat his ground and continued his melancholy.

The door paused. And then chimed.

“Will you go the fuck away, you karking asshole?” he yelled, jumping up, hulking already over whomever wasn’t in the room.

The door opened.

“I will do no such thing, Supreme Leader,” Hux said. Ren’s title sounded terrible from his mouth. As if his title were representative of some latrine fungus on the ass-end of Tattoine.

“You dare let yourself into my chambers, General?” Ren growled at him. Had he hackles, they would be risen. “Did you learn nothing earlier today?”

Had anyone else been in the room, they would not have seen the nearly imperceptible flinch Hux gave, the way his shoulders rose minutely. Ren, however, could, and relished this vulnerability. Finally, finally, the general feared him, after all these years. He needed Hux to fear him now, to have this proof of power. To know that Hux left him unaffected by their past together.

Hux relaxed himself and gazed placidly at Ren.

“What you showed me today is that you are an incompetent, emotional buffoon. We need to talk. And you need to listen, Ren”

“Do not presume to tell your Supreme Leader what he needs to do, General.” Ren felt his warning sufficient. If Hux continued this, he would show no leniency. This man had been a distraction, a thorn in his side for far too long. He resented the hold that Snoke had on him; he resented the hold Hux had on him. He resented everyone and wished, since they didn’t care about him, that they would just leave him alone. He needed none of them. He should show them all.

He would prove it to himself.

Hux was sneering at him.

“You need to listen to me, or you’ll drive the Order into the ground.” Hux’s voice was cold authority as he approached Ren.

“Don’t come any closer,” Ren ordered him.

“Why? Will you throw me across the room again? Will you kill me this time? Then you’ll be well and truly fucked, Ren.”

“Get out!”

And Ren raised his hand, on the verge of calling on the Force, indeed, to hurl Hux across the room.

But Hux has always been full of surprises.

He flinched. But then his mouth slid slowly into a sneer. His nostrils flared, and he flew at Ren, shoving his chest with his delicate hands.

“How could you? How dare you?” Hux yelled into Ren’s face. He slammed a fist into Ren’s chest and shoved him.

“Get off me!” Ren yelled, grabbing at Hux’s other arm.

And the two tumbled to the ground. Ren lifted himself onto his elbows.

Hux looked wild. He shoved Ren back down and wrapped his hands around Ren’s throat.

“What do you think you’re doing, fool?” Ren’s voice was a hiss.

Hux pulled his hands back and knelt between Ren’s thighs.

“How could you?” he asked quietly. He struck Ren’s thigh. Then, with a choked whimper curled over Ren’s stomach.

“Don’t you,” he whispered, “ever do that to me again.” Ren saw the other man’s shoulders hunch up. “Don’t ever touch me again. Don’t ever treat me like that again, or I’ll kill you.”

“Kill me?” Ren laughed. “As if you could. You’re far too weak—”

Hux looked up, his face stricken, his eyes shining with tears.

Ren’s laughter stopped. He stared wide-eyed at Hux.

Hux leaned his head down onto Ren’s stomach, and began to sob.

“How could you?” he repeated. “You know better—you know all of it, but you treated me just like he did! How could you? Why, Ren, why would you do that to me?”

Ren had never seen Hux cry. He was fairly certain no one had and was left alive to tell of it. But now Hux sobbed so hard into his stomach, he could feel the dampness already on his skin.

He reached a hand to his Hux’s hair, still gelled, but still as soft as he recalled. He listened, his eyes closed. Despair rolled off the general, agony. Disbelief that Ren could hit so low. That Ren would strike him like his father had. That Ren would also call him weak.

Hux clutched at Ren’s tunic and wept, his shoulders shaking.

Ren stared at him, conflicted. Even though they’d ended months ago—after a relapse after Starkiller, briefly, for a day, Ren swore—they were done. They’d honestly been done for longer, but they had difficulty keeping their hands off each other.

He hated Hux. Hux hated him. They hadn’t always, but it was better this way, surely?

Except.

Why did his chest hurt so much now, watching Hux—stoic, ice prince Hux—finally cry? Why did he care that he’d caused this? Why did he feel a horrid, roiling guilt in his gut for having treated this man like his father had treated him.

Ren knew. He knew better.

He reached and lifted Hux’s face. Hux’s eyes caught his own, darted away.

They were shining with tears, a bright green. His nose was red, and his eyebrows were furrowed deeply. His breath caught delicately in his throat as he choked back another sob.

Ren had never seen this before. He traced a hand along Hux’s jaw.

“Don’t—” he said brokenly.

Ren sat up as Hux pulled away. Ren grabbed him by the arms.

“Let me go.” Hux looked afraid for the first time.

Ren pulled him against his chest and held him. Hux turned his face away, but Ren began to stroke his hair. Hux pulled his arms into himself nervously, an attempt to shrink himself, to disappear.

“Please let me go,” he whispered, and his voice broke again.

“I’m sorry,” Ren said.

Hux stiffened.

 “I need you,” Ren continued. “You’re the only one who tells me the truth.”

He pulled Hux away from himself and for a moment, watched his face. Hux refused to look at him. A lonely tear slipped down his cheek, and Ren caught it on his fingertip.

“You aren’t weak,” Ren told him. “You deal with me every day. You always protect me, even if it is your job. You don’t have to, not really, but you do.”

Hux flicked a look at him through his lashes. Ren had forgotten how long they were, the burnished gold color of them.

“You aren’t weak,” he repeated. And then, quietly, “You’re beautiful.”

Hux closed his eyes and took a shaking a breath. Ren leaned his forehead to Hux’s.

“I won’t hurt you again,” he said.

“How can I trust that?”

“I’m not asking you to. Not yet. I’ll show you. I’ll prove it. And if I fail—” Ren took a breath and touched a hand to Hux’s cheek, “do what you need to.”

“Swear it on your grandfather.”

“I swear upon my grandfather, Darth Vader, I will never hurt you again.”

Hux opened his eyes and nodded.

Ren leaned forward to kiss his forehead. He inhaled the scent of Hux—his hair gel, his skin, the underlying smell, something like a cinnamon cookie—a strange juxtaposition for the stolid general.

“I will never hurt you again,” Ren murmured, “Grand Marshall.”

Hux pulled back to stare at him.

“You are now Grand Marshal, like you should always have been. This is how I show you my intentions.”

Hux smiled a small smile, a pleased smile. He leaned back into Ren and whispered into his neck, “Thank you, Ren.”


	2. Gather Our Mirrors

Some nights, yes, Ren likes to be ordered around, teased and tormented. He likes Hux’s cold, officious accent murmuring warmly, insidiously, filthily into his ears as he’s unable to move, unable to do anything but obey Hux, cry out to Hux, worship Hux. He’ll go to bed sore but sated, warmed in Hux’s arms some nights. It’s good. He’s content with the arrangement, as long as he doesn’t contemplate how much he seems to need Hux.

Some nights, though, Hux is gentle and sweet. This would be nearly mortifying for anyone who has never fucked Hux before, but these two have a long history: tumultuous to be sure, but there were times long ago and now more recently, when Hux sparked such a warmth in Ren’s chest, that he could almost forget everything, everyone else.

Tonight was the latter.

Ren had meditated so long, so deeply, that he felt nearly lost in the darkness. Hux had found him, worried that he had not heard from Ren all day, and called him back.

No one had ever called him back before. No one had ever met him upon his return either. But Hux had been there, his arms already around Ren, whispering his name, calling him back home; and he’d returned to himself shuddering and fearful, but warm in Hux’s arms.

Such slim arms, but they could grasp the whole galaxy.

Over the past months, he’d kept his promise to his Grand Marshal, his sexual companion. He raised no hand to him and listened to him, and their antagonism had gentled into a sort of fondness.

The sex was very good for both of them. And without Snoke, they’d become closer than they’d ever been.

Sometimes, Ren felt like they were both waiting for the other shoe to drop.

But not tonight.

Tonight, Hux’s lips roamed over Ren’s body, his hands following. He was a surveyor mapping out a strange, beautiful land no one else had ever seen before.

No one else had. Only Hux.

Hux kissed each mole upon his face, his nipples, his navel. He pressed his naked body to Ren’s gently, reveling in the warmth of skin against skin. He kissed strands of Ren’s hair. His slim hand caressed the inside of Ren’s arm, down his chest, down along the flat of his hips. Hux purred and moved to kiss there, along the sharp cut to his groin, a favored spot. His tongue lingered on Ren’s hip as he slipped a hand softly between Ren’s thighs.

Ren’s hips rose.

“Easy, baby,” Hux murmured and climbed back up to kiss Ren.

Yes, tonight was a gentle night.

 

 

**

 

Hux had found the empty shell of Ren earlier this evening. He knew Ren’s—soul? essence?—his self was far away. He’d witnessed this before, but this was worse. Ren’s body was stiff, almost as if it were experiencing rigor mortis. Hux feared this, like he’d feared little else in his life.

He had managed to recline with Ren upon the floor, upon some pillows, and had called Ren back to him.

Secretly, Hux resented the Force. He loathed it for nearly succeeding in taking the one thing for which he cared from him, even if he never said that to Ren.

But Ren returned, and Hux counted that a victory.

“Hello,” he said quietly as Ren opened his eyes.

Surprise showed on Ren’s face as his eyes refocused and he took in Hux’s face. The thick red brows were raised delicately, and a soft smile lay upon his lips as he examined Ren. He brought a pale, gloveless hand to Ren’s cheek and stroked it.

“You’re here,” Ren answered groggily.

“Mm, yes. I grew concerned when I didn’t hear from the Supreme Leader all day. Thought I’d check up on you?”

“You were concerned?”

“Mmhm.”

“Worried about me?”

“Yes, Ren. When I got here, you looked—” Hux’s voice dropped off; his brow furrowed. He looked away from Ren.

“What?” Ren insisted, just as quietly.

“You looked dead,” Hux whispered.

Ren shivered, fearful, and clutched at his Grand Marshal. “But you called me back. I heard you. I saw you.”

“Yes.”

Hux couldn’t look at Ren as the latter trembled, just pulled him tightly to his chest, tucking Ren’s face to the crook of his own neck. Ren’s breath came in frightened huffs, warming Hux’s skin. He rubbed Ren’s back.

“You’re here now. You’re safe, baby.”

Ren’s body gave a long shudder at Hux’s words. He pulled away to regard Hux a moment. When he made no further movements, Hux took Ren’s face in his hands and gently kissed his lips.

This Ren was his, even if the Force claimed every other part of Ren. Hux had this. And at this point, Hux wouldn’t take for granted this tiny portion of his Supreme Leader. After all their years knowing each other, finding and taking and losing Ren—if, in the end, he only had this, he would horde it greedily, clutch it to himself until the very end. He doubted now that he could ever have more. So be it.

So be it.

Perhaps it was better this way. Ren brought out a softness in him he’d tried years ago to expunge from himself. A potent desire for the man warred with his ambition, his desire for the First Order’s dominance.

He feared Ren made him weak.

He feared the fact that he didn’t fully seem to mind.

He feared that he was getting to the point where he’d do anything for this man.

Dangerous ground, this.

And yet, he deepened the kiss, his left hand cupping the back of Ren’s head. The other man whimpered and clutched at his uniform jacket.

“You’re so warm,” Ren murmured “I was so cold in the darkness.”

“You’re not there anymore, baby,” Hux told him, and Ren shut his eyes at the endearment, took a shaking breath. “Come to bed, Ren.”

He stood and half-helped Ren to stand. Ren was unsteady, trembling, so Hux wrapped an arm about his waist and led him to his bed.

Ren had, at least, recently upgraded to a full-size bed, so Hux didn’t sleep smashed between the wall and his gigantic lover, when he stayed.

If he stayed.

Sometimes.

Did Ren want him or not? Or did the Force make it all irrelevant. It did, he suspected.

Tonight, though, he would stay. Ren needed him.

He undressed after siting Ren on the bed, and then he gently stripped Ren. He situated Ren under the covers before joining him and holding him close. He kissed Ren’s brow and stroked his ears, a thing Ren, despite his embarrassment over their size, very much loved. Hux smiled into his dark curls.

“You’d better stop, Hux. I’m getting hard.”

“You always do when I pet your ears.”

“So this is intentional?”

“Maybe. But it also calms you.”

“You’d better fix this, Hux. That’s an order from your Supreme Leader.”

Hux snorted, somehow elegantly. “Really? Are you up for that, Supreme Leader?”

“You doubt my capabilities?” Ren growled.

“Of course not.”

Ren flipped him on his back and watched him hungrily. Hux stared back, incapable of the simple, automatic task of breathing. He devoured Ren’s eyes, his lips, his uneven beautiful face. He realized again he’d give up everything, if this man only asked it of him.

“Did I hurt you?” Ren asked quickly, his eyes fearful, perfect lips frowning.

Hux shook himself.

“No, baby, no. I was just thinking how lovely you are. And since you looked so dear and frightened a moment ago, you should let me make you feel better.”

Ren scoffed, “Afraid?”

“Just lay back. Let me,” Hux said earnestly. “Let me.”

Ren obeyed. Of course. He almost always obeyed Hux in bed, if nowhere else.

And so Hux tended to Ren’s needs gently. Hux, too, loved nights where they were both bruised and exhausted. But there were times when he needed to show Ren how he felt. Even if he could never admit it, he could allow his hands, his mouth and tongue, his cock, to give Ren’s body all the information Ren needed in order to realize the depth of Hux’s feelings. But, even though Ren’s body might know, Ren himself did not. Or he’d never allow this to continue.

Hux kissed his body, each pressure point. He dragged his palms up and down Ren’s chest. Carefully worked his way down the beautiful mass of him to rest his head against Ren’s thigh.

Ren stared down his body and Hux’s half-closed eyes regarding him in turn. Hux kissed along his groin, and Ren whimpered.

“You are delicious, you are perfect, beautiful boy,” Hux murmured before taking all of Ren into his mouth to the back of his throat.

Ren whimpered as Hux tended to him. Hux had asked for nothing tonight, seemed intent on spoiling him, but Ren obeyed. He could obey.

Ren loved this praise. So Hux praised him. Hux held out no hope that this would make Ren love him. If anything, he thought dolefully, it actually strengthened Hux’s feelings for Ren.

All he could do was refuse to say the word.

He crouched betwixt Ren’s thighs, pleasuring him sweetly as Ren whimpered and sobbed. He raised his eyes and watched Ren’s wide mouth choking back his name, his doe eyes squeezed shut, the flushed and overwhelmed look of him. Hux’s eyes smarted at this sight, so he closed them and focused completely on Ren’s pleasure. He would not think about his own feelings, only on the pleasure he could give Ren.

He worshipped Ren’s cock. He kissed and adored it. He exulted in the pressure of it on his tongue, in his throat. He pulled and licked and nipped at Ren’s cock until Ren’s hand clutched itself into his hair, and Ren was crying his name over and over in a cracked voice.

It felt like a benediction. Like glory. Like being handed the universe, eternity. Like being at the right hand of some god, even if he didn’t believe in god. Even if Ren was his god.

Hux pulled off of Ren and squeezed his own eyes shut, waiting until he was calm.

“Hux,” Ren called.

A moment. And then Hux crawled up to kiss Ren.

“Let me,” Ren managed to say.

“No, no, I’m good. Wanted to take care of you, baby.”

Ren watched him with those damnable eyes, attempting to gauge how all right Hux was. Hux leaned down to kiss his wonderful nose.

Spent, emotional himself, he flopped onto his back beside Ren, and the Supreme Leader of the Galaxy turned on his side to gather up his Grand Marshal in his arms. With his head resting on Ren’s arm, Hux curled his hands up and over Ren’s other arm that wrapped around his chest. Ren nuzzled his sideburn.

They were quiet for a while as Ren held him, Hux reveling in this closeness. The highest level of intimacy he’d ever been given with another person. He knew this respite was brief, but he would greedily take whatever Ren gave him.

Ren stirred beside Hux and held him closer.

“Mine,” Ren said. His voice was low, wrapped in adamant possessiveness. Hux felt it curl down his spine and settle in the pit of his stomach. He felt unaccountable joy.

“What?” he said. Please, he thought; he wanted Ren to tell him again.

“You’re mine,” Ren repeated, “all mine.”

“Yes,” Hux breathed.

“Mine, no one else’s. No one else can have you. You are mine,” Ren growled into his ear.

“Yes. I’m yours,” Hux said. He shut his eyes. He was unguarded in this moment, laid bare for Ren, open to Ren’s possession.

“You would never betray me, would you, Grand Marshal?” Ren husked into his ear.

“Of course not, Supreme Leader,” Hux said with a smile, so open, “I love you.”

A pause in the machine of the galaxy.

Kriff. He’d said it.

His eyes widened; his hands flew to his mouth.

The moment of truth, Armitage.

And Ren pulled away from him, leaving him empty, bereft.

“What did you say?” Ren’s voice was hoarse, disbelieving, almost angry.

“I love you,” Hux whispered.

Ren lay flat on his back, no part of him touching Hux now.

“Do not say that ever again. This is finished. It’s been a mistake. I was a fool to think—” He punched the mattress beside himself.

Hux stiffened, remained silent.

“The Dark Side doesn’t allow love. What were you thinking? I don’t love. I take pleasure where I need it. But I belong to the Dark Side. Your petty feeling is nothing to me. Don’t ever say that again. Don’t ever come to me again. I cannot love. I am only beholden to the Dark. I only desire the Dark. This… this fucking we do is nothing. We are nothing.”

“Ren—” Hux began, reaching to touch him.

“Do not touch me. Don’t lay a finger on me. You were a fool to expect more, Grand Marshal.”

Ren rolled away from Hux, presenting him with his broad back, curled coldly away from him.

Hux couldn’t move.

It was over.

He’d ruined it.

Weak and stupid and useless. Even Ren didn’t want him, in the end. Who did? What was he worth, outside of the First Order’s need for his mind and capabilities, which he’d fostered to the point where he was at least needed.

But who, in the end, wanted him?

He scarce realized that he was crying. Not simply crying; he was wracked with despairing sobs.

And Ren ignored him.

Hux couldn’t move. If he moved from this bed, the thought he might die. He wanted just one moment more, even if it killed him later.

He cried so hard he began to hiccup.

Ren continued ignoring him.

Hux refused to look at that absurd and lovely and cruel creature to whom he’d inadvertently given his heart—long ago, in all honesty—and faced the opposite direction. His back to Ren’s, he curled himself into a ball, only himself left to embrace himself, and sobbed until his eyes hurt. Sobbed until his nose clogged. Sobbed until his head ached.

Sobbed until he found the only remaining respite from his despair—and fell asleep.


	3. Swimming in Gray

 

 

It had been a full week since Hux had last been with Ren. The Supreme Leader refused Hux so much as a glimpse of himself beyond the usual meetings and planning sessions.

Watching Ren’s eyes flit from face to face around the conference table, looking anywhere but at Hux, filled Hux with sorrow and a strange sense of what he could only assume was jealousy.

See me, Ren. Look at me, he thought nearly every moment of every day.

Ren never did. Occasionally, it seemed to Hux that Ren heard him. Ren’s eyes would shoot to his Grand Marshal and widen, but Ren never acknowledged him.

Another full week passed in this manner. Hux could barely bring himself to sleep, never mind eat. He survived on ration bars. He knew this was less than ideal for the second most powerful man in the galaxy, but hunger made itself scarce.

Two weeks without a word. Once this fact wouldn’t have bothered him in the least. He would have been relieved, would have accomplished so much more without interference from that giant buffoon.

And now look at me, he told himself. Look at yourself, your pale skin and hollowed eyes. You are far more useful as a computer. As a cunning manipulator. As a brilliant engineer. Without your mind, what have you to offer, Armitage? Precious little in the way of beauty, and you have to hide your scrawniness under layers of clothing.

He turned from the mirror in his fresher. He could not look at himself. Of course Ren was possessive. He thought everything was his. Hux was just another possession, another part of the galaxy to rule, the most useful cog in the machine of the First Order.

He was nothing to Ren.

Hux stripped to his undergarments and attempted to sleep.

He failed miserably. 

 

 

The next day, we went to R&D to look over a new blaster prototype he’d designed. Something simple and potent to give the children suitable practice. He was pleased with the progress, but he wished to add a few adjustments himself, as always. And few things calmed his nerves like designing did.

He entered the room to the hurried salutes of the engineers and techs; it took a moment for him to realize that all of them looked distressed.

At the far end of the room, he saw the reason for their twitchiness.

And attempted with a modicum of success to stifle his own mortification.

“Supreme Leader,” he said with a formal little bow.

“Grand Marshal,” Ren answered without so much a look at him.

Hux clenched his jaw.

“What brings you here, sire?”

Ren’s brow arched at the term.

“I am,” he responded, slightly annoyed, “attempting to rebuild my mask. But there are certain components of this that I am—unfamiliar with.” He gestured with exasperation at the technology.

“How did you manage to craft it in the first place?” Hux muttered. Ren glowered at him in response.

“Here, let me look, Ren.”

Hux leaned over Ren’s shoulder. He managed to refrain from smelling the ozone and salt smell of Ren to which he’d grown accustomed.

With which he’d fallen in love.

He took Ren’s mask and examined it—or, rather, the pieces of it.

“We can solder it, a bonding material, perhaps crystalline, would be effective, and add some new pieces as well. I could…” Hux pondered as he turned a piece over in his hands. “I could modify this further, Supreme Leader. Improve vision, audio, yes, hmm,” and Hux lost himself in design and calculations, nearly forgetting everyone else in the room. The techs calmed as they watched Hux handling their Supreme Leader. His exhaustion lifted; his eyes seemed to shine more brightly, and he had a brilliant, pleased smile on his face. Ren grabbed his wrist.

Hux jumped.

“Supreme Leader?”

“I made the original myself. You think to correct me?” Ren asked, eyes narrowing. His grip tightened.

Hux’s face fell.

“No, not at all, sir. I merely thought that I could assist. I know how to use all of these tools, and I suddenly had some wonderful ideas for modifications. I could… oversee this, if you’d like?”

“What, so you could slip poison in, or perhaps a knife that will stab me through the eye? Kill me with my own creation?” Ren said vindictively, quietly.

Hux stepped back. He pulled at his arm, but Ren refused to release him. He looked hurt. Ren immediately attempted to feel less guilty.

“No, Ren. I thought perhaps I could assist you. Never mind. I see you can get on without me,” Hux said quietly back. Coldy.

He tugged again, but Ren refused to release him.

“Let me go, Ren,” he whispered.

“No, Grand Marshal,” Ren replied firmly. He relented, just a bit. “Tell me, if I allowed you to rebuild my mask, what would you do?” Ren paused and whispered so only Hux could hear, “I need my face back.”

Hux caught his eye. Ren stared back into the Grand Marshal’s eyes. They looked softly green right now. Something caught in Ren’s throat.

He knew these eyes well, how changeable the color could be. The bright bluish when he worked on Starkiller, the chill air reddening his cheeks as he strode around giving orders, fixing things, showing Ren his wonderful, awful creation. The bright bluish-green of his anger, eyes snapping and glaring as he let loose words that could flay a man alive. The soft green, like now, when they—

Ren shook his head.

When they fucked, Hux looked at him just like he looked at him now. Ren did not want those eyes on him.

He needed his face. His real face. The impassive face of Kylo Ren.

Hux took hold of a piece of mask again, examined it. Examined Ren.

“What would you do to fix it?”

“Well, Ren, I could draw up some schematics for your perusal this evening. If you wish to come—”

“I’m not,” Ren interrupted, “coming to your rooms.”

Hux’s lashes lowered, brushed his cheeks gently. They were long and lovely; Ren wanted to pull them out.

“Come to my office this evening before shift end. I’ll even leave the door open, if you fear for your chastity,” Hux said impatiently.

“Fine,” Ren replied just as impatiently. He stood, looming over Hux, looking down his nose at Hux, for once. “I expect to be impressed with your ideas, Grand Marshal.”

Hux clenched his jaw. “You will, sir.”

 

 

And later that night, before Hux’s shift ended, Ren was impressed. How in all the hells Hux managed to find the time to design all of this, Ren had no idea. It would look beautiful, with some sort of red polymer, or some material Ren didn’t know, affixing the pieces, mending the cracks—all red and black and chrome. He’d improved upon the vocoder and audio and visual capabilities. And somehow the olfactory capabilities. Ren barely comprehended all that Hux said, all he’d done. But he was impressed, if a bit trepidatious.

“Will it still feel like me?” he asked.

Hux’s gaze shifted from his blueprints to take in Ren’s nervous countenance.

“Yes, I think so. I won’t change the main design. I’ll use the remains of the original mask—your original face,” he amended. “I’ll only improve upon the bells and whistles, shall we say.”

Ren wrung his hands.

“I promise, I will not do any of these things if you do not approve of them.”

And here, Hux pulled the schematics up so Ren could get a 3-D view. He pointed out some improvements as Ren nodded along.

“Fine,” Ren said at last. “I approve of all of this. Just—”

“Yes, Supreme Leader?”

“I want it as soon as possible. But I don’t want anyone else working on this. Just you. No one else can touch it.”

“I’m flattered you trust me, Supreme Leader, but I have many responsibilities…”

Ren looked thunderous. “Can you do it or not? Must I give some of your responsibilities to someone else?”

Hux straightened, glared icily from beneath his soft, lush brows. “I can, of course, accomplish this. But you will, of course, need to be patient. I only have so many hours in a day, and I am quite literally the only person who can do all that I do. Supreme Leader.”

Now Hux was angry with him.

Ren sighed. The tension between them lately was palpable. Even the troopers could feel it. Ren could do nothing about it. Hux had crossed a line confessing his feelings. And Ren could not allow sentiment. Not when he needed the Dark, not when he had so much left to accomplish. He also needed his second-in-command free from slavish lust and absurd emotions like love.

He said simply, “Fine. I leave it to you.”

 

 

He gave Hux two days before he asked:

“How is it? Is it finished yet?”

Hux was flabbergasted. “Do you truly have no idea how long building tech nearly from scratch takes?”

Ren muttered something non-committal, but decidedly unapologetic.

 

 

After another day, he approached Hux again. Hux looked exhausted.

“Not yet, Ren. Soon. I promise.”

Ren nodded and left him to it.

 

 

On the fourth day, Hux came to him. Ren received him in his rooms and was aghast at how pale and drawn the Grand Marshal looked. He swayed a little on his feet, his hands awkwardly behind his back.

“Supreme Leader,” he greeted Ren. “Please close your eyes and hold out your hands.”

“Are you going to kill me or something?” Ren replied in an offhanded manner.

Hux frowned. His brow furrowed.

“Hux, I’m not serious! Fine, I’ll do it.”

He couldn’t see the pleased smile Hux gave him. He felt something being placed in his hands.

“Open your eyes, Ren.”

He gasped, disbelieving, at the perfect, beautiful mask in his hands, lighter than his old one, chrome shining, red lacing through the black.

“It’s finished, Supreme Leader,” Hux whispered happily.

And fell at Ren’s feet.

 

 

Hux didn’t remember much. He vaguely recalled waking up on the floor beside Ren’s feet. Somehow? How had that happened? Ren must have carried him. That’s all he remembered. He came blearily awake, unaware of the time or even his location. He attempted to sit up, but that made him too dizzy. He collapsed back onto numerous pillows propping him up.

And he was no longer in his uniform.

Had he gotten drunk? Had they fucked? Surely not! Ren hadn’t touched him in over two weeks.

Kriff—had he fainted in front of the Supreme Leader? He’d done everything Ren had asked, on top of everything else he did. It shouldn’t have been an issue—only four days of ration bars and stims and nearly no sleep. Was he too old for this?

Stars, he really was useless.

And so embarrassed to show such weakness before Kylo Ren.

A sob escaped him; he tried to stifle it with a fist in his mouth.

He needed to leave. Now. Just collect his things and go before Ren came back and demoted him. After a few moments, he stood. He could hear Ren somewhere, in the kitchenette perhaps. But he couldn’t find his clothes. He panicked and decided to forego his uniform. He could get it tomorrow. He could have Ren make anyone who saw him forget. Unless Ren wished him to be humiliated as he exiled him.

The tears came harder, and he hiccupped.

Not this again.

He stumbled from the room and made for the door.

“Hux?”

He ignored his Supreme Leader and continued stealthily to the door, although his stealth was an utter failure.

“Hux,” Ren repeated and grabbed his arm. “Where do you think you’re going?”

“I’m fine, I’m just going back to my office to finish—” his voice petered out.

“To finish what? Where do you think you’re going,” Ren said again, “in your underwear?”

Hux looked down at himself and blushed. His thin, soft body held in place by Ren’s voice, Ren’s touch.

“I have to go,” he whispered.

“No, no, hey, stop.” Ren grabbed him by both arms. “You fainted. At first I thought it was an assassination attempt, someone or something in the room with us, or poison or something like it. I was terrified.”

“Yes, that would be inconvenient, “ Hux said waspishly. Or attempted to.

“Hux, when was the last time you ate? The last time you slept?”

“I ate a bar this morning and napped afterward for fifteen minutes,” he replied. “I’m absolutely fine.”

“The fuck you are! What in the world were you doing?”

Hux’s mouth dropped. “Really? What was I doing? I was making your mask, Ren, because you obviously needed it!”

Awareness dawned on Ren.

Hux had finished it in four days. On top of everything else he did for the First Order.

For Ren

Because Ren was desperate for his real face.

Hux’s eyes turned to the floor. “Please let me go,” he said tremulously. “I’m fine. I’ll be fine for tomorrow, I swear.” He tried to pull away and nearly collapsed.

So Ren hoisted him into his arms.

“No,” he told Hux firmly. “You are going to lay down. I’ll be in shortly.”

He placed Hux gently in the rumpled bed and covered him, pushing him back against the pillows.

“Stay.”

Clearly expecting to be obeyed, Ren retreated to the small kitchen. Hux waited until he heard Ren puttering about before he slipped again from the bed and tried to stumble as quietly as possible to the door. He nearly made it.

“Armitage Hux!”

He cringed. He knew what was coming. He backed against the door.

“I’m sorry. I won’t do it again. I’ll go back to bed. Please don’t be angry,” he whispered. He shook uncontrollably, huddled into himself. His hair fell across his forehead and his brow furrowed.

As Ren approached, Hux wrapped his arms around himself. Ren stopped right in front of him.

Ren would truly be the death of him.

Precedent dictated that, with the state in which he currently found himself—an absolute starving, exhausted wreck—he would end up with an earful of curses and a fist to the gut. He braced himself.

Yet he found himself surprised to say the least when Ren pulled him into a hug.

Hux continued apologizing as Ren tried to hush him. Ren gathered him into his arms yet again. Once more, he bundled him into bed with an admonition to remain before he returned to the kitchen.

Hux curled onto his side, attempting futilely to calm himself. He wanted to leave, but he was afraid that Ren really would be furious with him this time.

Ren was ruining him. He knew he’d never truly recover from whatever this was.

A broken heart, his frazzled mind supplied.

He wanted to deny it, but he had always been too self-aware. That was part of how he had survived and succeeded.

But Ren undid all of it.

He should have killed him in the throne room, he decided grimly, but he also knew he didn’t mean that.

Maybe he should just let Ren end him. Beg for it.

He sniffed loudly.

What an ignominious end.

“Hey, sit up. You can sleep after you eat.”

Hux started at Ren’s voice. It was quiet, gentle. He came out from under Ren’s blankets—that smelled just like him, Hux noted forlornly—and looked at Ren.

Ren sat on the edge of the bed, propping his knee up and facing Hux. In his hands he had some sort of non-regulation pottery bowl filled with off-white mush. Butter melted on top of it.

“Forgive me. I’ve humiliated myself, Supreme Leader.”

“No,” said Ren. “I tried it on while you were asleep. It’s perfect. I look like myself again. I feel like myself again. It’s my face, but even more so. Ever since I… listened to Snoke, you know, destroyed my face, I haven’t been myself. It’s been a nightmare.” He reached a hand to brush a lingering tear from Hux’s pale cheek.

Hux’s breath caught in his throat.

So did Ren’s.

They stayed like that for a moment, until another stray tear slid from Hux’s eye.

“Here,” Ren said immediately. He dipped a spoon into the gruel.

“Kriff, no, what is that?”

“Wheat cream with brown sugar and butter?”

“What in all hells, Ren?”

“Just try it. It’s good and it’s gentle on your stomach. I made it for you,” Ren said defensively. “Here,” and he popped the spoon into his own mouth.

Hux watched that mouth, transfixed. How he adored that mouth!

Ren stirred the gruel and presented the spoon for Hux’s edification.

“Try it.”

Hux leaned forward shyly an allowed Ren to feed him, even though it made him feel like a child.

He tested it with his tongue, and then took the spoon into his own mouth.

It was very odd, but, as Ren claimed, surprisingly good. The warm butter melted on his tongue, and the sweetness made the texture palatable. It all tasted somehow comforting.

“Drink some water,” Ren told him and he obeyed. He accepted another spoonful of the gruel.

They finished the bowl together, Ren occasionally eating a bit to coax Hux into having more. Ren fed him the entire time, and occasionally had him stop to wash it down with water.

When they finished the bowl, Ren bade Hux lay down to sleep. He reluctantly obeyed. But then Ren curled up against his back and held him close. Hux’s lips trembled as Ren’s breath ghosted over his ear. Hux didn’t dare speak, for fear of saying the wrong thing, of breaking the spell. Instead, he focused on breathing deeply, breathing in the scent of Ren that he had missed so much. Ren sighed, then spoke

“You gave me my face back. I was afraid to look at myself, to remake myself. I looked at the… wreck I had made of myself, of everything, and I couldn’t see a way to mend it. But you did. So take better care of yourself from now on.”

Hux nodded, swallowing hard.

“I need you, Hux. I don’t know how to do any of this without you.”

Not the words Hux wished to hear. They both knew it. But he would take what he would get.

“Get some sleep,” Ren said.

“Goodnight, Ren,” Hux murmured back. He nestled into Ren’s arms.

Just for tonight, though he knew it would only make him feel miserable, he let himself pretend he had what he wanted. He pretended he had Ren; that Ren wanted nothing more than the weak, heartsick man in his bed, in his arms.


	4. The Monster Under Your Bed is Greedy

Things settled back into the old routine. More nights than not Hux and Ren spent together, Hux screaming Ren’s name before he settled down to sleep. Some nights, Ren was distracted afterwards and would leave Hux’s rooms, where they spent most of their time.

Ren knew how Hux felt, but he chose to ignore it. He usually managed to pretend Hux didn’t love him. Ren was adept at ignoring that which inconvenienced him. But he knew that Hux was the only person he trusted. He would never call that family, but Hux was all he had.

Occasionally, Hux didn’t care, and would tell Ren, “I love you,” as they fucked. It frustrated Ren, and he might become a bit rough, but Hux enjoyed that too.

There was an energy around Ren. There always had been, but Hux found himself noticing it more and more as they became increasingly intimate with each other.

It was hard to describe.

Hux wouldn’t have believed in its existence if he hadn’t felt it himself. It almost felt like some kind of living energy, separate from Ren, but part of him too.

Hux had heard of the Force, of course, and had always dismissed it. And so nothing could have prepared him for what it meant to be in Ren’s presence. To viscerally experience the way Ren’s essence seem to flare out like a volatile, unstable electrical current.

It truly was impossible to explain.

He had encountered nothing like it in all his studies of science. Hux himself had no Force sensitivity, whatever that meant, and yet he could feel the very air around him crackling with Ren’s presence, he could sense Ren’s intense emotions, barely contained within Ren’s body, on a hair trigger, ready to explode with the force of a supernova.  

And sometimes, like tonight, Ren’s power was so overwhelming that Hux seemed to feel it vibrating throughout his body halfway across the Finalizer. Everyone on the ship must have felt it, even if they never talked about it. That feeling of a coming storm, an invisible horror, an electrical hum in the air, the hairs on your arm standing on end. It disturbed him through most of his second shift, but he was merely filing some financial forms when it finally became too much.

He finished and, after conversing with Captain Peavey about the next shift, Hux made his way to Ren’s quarters.

He buzzed.

Again.

And again.

He waited for a full two minutes before he let himself inside the Supreme Leader’s chambers.

It smelled of fetid earth and ozone and unwashed bodies. He wrinkled his nose in distaste. Even at his worst, in the deep downward spiral after Crait, Ren’s cabin had never smelled like this. Hux would have been lying if he said he wasn’t worried.

“Ren?” he called.

There was no answer. And he knew for a fact Ren was aboard the Finalizer. His Silencer and command shuttle were both in the hangar bay. More importantly, he’d been regularly alerting Hux when he’d be gone. He’d even been giving him a modicum of detail about his recent missions. Ren had, it seemed, become far more conscientious of Hux’s concern.

Hux bent to retrieve Ren’s mask from the floor. He frowned at the carelessness it had been shown; his brow furrowed further because it seemed to prove Ren was in distress, so hurriedly had he shed his mask. And his cloak. And his clothes and boots.

And Hux followed the trail to Ren’s refresher.

No sound from within save for a constant drip-drip of water.

The worst thing came to Hux, and he had difficulty swallowing. Surely, Ren wouldn’t have—surely, he would have known were something truly upsetting Ren—surely, Ren would have told him—

“Ren!”

Hux barged through the unlocked door. His heart choked him, his chest in agony at what he feared he might see.

And relief was pure and sweet as he saw Ren sitting in the tub, arms wrapped around his knees. Despite the fact that he hardly fit in the tub, he looked like a frightened child. Hux released the breath trapped in his body and approached the tub.

“Ren, are you quite all right?” he asked gently. He didn’t touch him. Not yet.

Ren’s eyes were closed. He said not a word.

“Ren,” Hux knelt beside the tub. “Are you all right? What is it?”

He reached out a tentative hand to Ren’s cheek. The air around the Supreme Leader buzzed, felt thick, as if Hux were reaching through a quagmire to get to Ren. When he finally made contact with Ren’s flushed skin, his fingers went numb, as though something zapped them. He yanked his hand away.

“Don’t touch me,” Ren murmured, eyes still shut, squeezed tightly, as if he were in pain.

“What’s going on?” Hux asked and reached once more for him.

“Don’t touch me!”

Ren shivered and moved away.

Hux noticed how red his pale skin was. He noticed now the steam coming off the bath water. He took off his glove and dipped his fingers in.

“Kriff, Ren! That water is scalding! Are you trying to burn yourself?”

He grabbed at Ren, tried to pull him close, out of the water, anything; Ren pulled away again.

“It was cold when I got in. Don’t touch me. I could hurt you!”

“Cold? You’re clearly mistaken. Come out of there. Let me help you.”

“I can’t come out. It could be dangerous. Just go away. I know what I’m doing.”

“I’m not going to leave you sitting in scalding bath water when you clearly have  a fever! You’re ill!”

“I’m not ill. I just can’t control it right now. I’m unbalanced. It happens sometimes. You wouldn’t understand. I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Try me,” said Hux.

“No.”

“How long have you been in the tub, then?”

“I don’t know,” Ren mumbled. “Maybe eight hours. The water neutralizes it. The Force. When I can’t contain it. I just need to meditate. Which I can’t do with you distracting me. Go away.”

Hux looked askance at him. He peered more closely at Ren’s flushed, oddly waterlogged skin. He gingerly reached toward Ren as the other man flinched further away. Hux knelt beside the tub and traced a finger down Ren’s feverish skin. Steam swirled around Ren’s naked form in the tub, breathed from his flesh, as if he were afire inside. Hux felt the heat on his face, frowned as a bead of sweat slipped from his hairline.

“This obviously isn’t working. Get out of there,” Hux ordered. He reached a hand under Ren’s armpit, ignoring the strange tickle of electricity prickling through his own body as he pulled. Whether the feeling was physiological in nature or purely in Hux’s mind, he couldn’t say. Whatever it was, it was unsettling.

Ren huffed. “I’m hurting you. Put me down.” And he clutched at the edge of the tub.

“No. You can either help me and make this much easier, or I will pull you out of the tub and probably on top of me, which won’t feel pleasant for either of us.”

With a sigh, Ren slowly heaved himself to his feet. He tilted unsteadily into Hux as the Grand Marshal righted him with a hand to the chest and the other arm around his back.

“Come, Ren,” he murmured and led him, dripping, from the fresher.

Ren was hot, soaking. Under normal circumstances, Hux would be excited by this. But his Supreme Leader looked ragged; seemed as if he were about to burst into flame or melt away. Hux sat Ren on the bed and fetched a towel.

At some point, Ren must have fully submerged himself in the water. His hair was still soaking, slipping rivulets of bath water down his chest, his shoulders, his back, only to have them perish into steam against his fevered skin.

Hux removed his other glove, his uniform jacket, and, sitting delicately beside his hunched Ren, began to towel his hair dry. Steam seeped through the towel. It was bizarre. How was Ren’s body tolerating such immense heat? How was Ren conscious, alive even? The Force, Hux knew, but how? As he dried Ren off, it was almost as if the strange energy was fleeing Ren’s body. After Hux had Ren serviceably dry, he fetched him cold water and ordered ice packs brought to Ren’s room. He turned down the thermostat. When the ice packs arrived, he bid Ren to recline in the bed, and he covered Ren with ice until Ren’s teeth began chattering.

He felt Ren’s skin. Less pink, not feverish. He seemed to be cooling down. The ice packs were mostly melted, the condensation making a lovely, great puddle around Ren, along with his sweat.

Hux stripped down to his black regulation boxer briefs and lay beside Ren. He gently traced his hand along Ren’s brow and profile.

Ren’s honey-colored eyes flicked to the Grand Marshall. His mouth was a rigid grimace and he shivered.

“Is your plan to freeze me to death and take over the First Order?” he asked. His voice sounded like the long-dead come back to life.

Hux frowned and ran his thumb along Ren’s scarred cheek.

“Really, Ren? That’s what you have to say to me?” He tried and, he suspected, failed not to look hurt.

Ren’s lips puffed out with his weak, bitter laugh.

“It really would make more sense than how you actually feel.”

Hux snatched his hand away. His eyes darted to Ren’s face—weary, warily observing him—and he rolled over the side of the bed to his feet.

His chest hurt.

“I’m merely doing my duty, Supreme Leader,” he said, and he kept his voice quiet enough that they could both ignore the quiver in it. “If you’d prefer, I’ll have medical take care of you.

“No!” Ren shouted. There was a painful creaking quality to his voice, like old bones. Like he’d burned through his throat. “No,” he repeated. “They wouldn’t understand.”

Hux sighed. He still refused to turn to him.

“And you think I do?” Hux said. “Help me understand.”

“I was trying to open a Sith holocron. It had belonged to Snoke. Now it belongs to me.”

Hux waited.

“Snoke knew… He must have seen it, how I would claim the holocron. He knew exactly where my mind would go. That lone tree, on the side of the mountain, growing out of the rocks where no life grows…”

“What was Ren even talking about?” Hux thought to himself. He kept his face neutral.

“He tricked me. Snoke did. The bastard. The whole time, I thought he was teaching me but he wasn’t, he was—trapping me. And even though he’s gone… I’m still trapped.”

Ren made a noise. A strange, animal noise. As if he were in pain. The puddle around Ren was evaporating, steam rising eerily off the bed.

Hux returned to Ren, placed his hand on Ren’s forehead. Hux didn’t understand the Force, but he did understand what it felt like to be used by Snoke. Hux felt his lip curl with disgust. Resentment gripped his heart. Of course Snoke wouldn’t let Ren destroy him without also having a plan in place to destroy Ren too.

Hux hated Snoke with a righteous fury.

“No,” Hux said possessively. “He can’t have you. I won’t let him. We’ll fix this. I’ll fix it myself.”

Hux did not understand the Force, but he was good at solving problems. And this was just another problem to be solved. From what Hux could see, Ren was suffering from some kind of imbalance, his body unable to contain and control its massive amount of power, and this problem was made worse by certain situations and factors—like the Sith holocron. If certain factors made the imbalance worse, then there had to be something that would make it better. There had to be. He just had to figure it out. Surely there was a way, some item that could be used to collect the run off, help Ren control and contain his power.

Hux went to his uniform on a nearby chair, and pulled out his datapad.

Ren watched him.

Hux powered on his datapad and began typing on it furiously. The light from the screen shone ghostly upon his skin. He looked like some phantom, some lovely, inhuman creature, even doing something so mundane as—whatever it was he was doing now. Calculations? Ren didn’t know. He remained silent as he watched Hux work.

“Is there some sort of item that can be used to collect and store Force energy?” Hux asked suddenly. “What if I could find a way to make a sort of battery that would drain the excess Force from you, to prevent this happening again. But it could store the energy so you could use it later?”

“I’m not sure that’s how the Force works, Hux.”

“Bah. It’s power. A latent power that resides within all living things, correct? Power can always be harnessed for later use. If the Force is all around us, it surely isn’t metaphysical. If it’s in everything, then it’s a universal power, not magic. Magic is nonsense. No, the Force is probably just,” he flapped a hand, “like electrical current or magnetism or gravity. Another element in the scientific arsenal of the physical world.”

Ren thought that sentiment was almost strangely poetic. Suddenly, Hux plopped down beside Ren and stared intently at him.

“I believe the Force is quantifiable,” he said. “Everything is, if one is able to discern how to measure it.”

“What about emotions?”

“Oh, absolutely. I could find ways to measure the physiological reactions, the neural patterns, the physical outcome of expressed or repressed emotion…”

“How about love, Hux?”

The green eyes dimmed. “Just a chemical reaction in the brain, Supreme Leader. Can’t be helped.”

Hux stood again. His dog tags slapped against his chest as he rose and began pacing.

“I think I can find something to help you,” he said quietly. “It would be temporary, until I’ve a chance to research it more.”

Ren surprised himself by pitying Hux. He thought it might be pity. Unfortunate to feel that. Pity, affection—more reasons why he was not as strong with the Dark Side as he should be. As he had to be. He tamped down his frustration and looked again to Hux. He rolled onto his side as his eyes followed the other man. He watched the pale arc Hux’s hand sliced through the air as he spoke, mostly to himself; the straightness of his back leading to the underappreciated curve of his ass; his long, slender legs. That ass, those legs, didn’t belong to an engineer, nor a general. What a strange amalgamation of parts was Hux.

“Are you feeling any better?”

“Hm?”

Startled from his observations on Armitage Hux, Ren shifted his eyes from those legs to that face, those eyes. Hux’s hair was loosened from its long day of stiffness, and his eyes were that soft grassy green again. Ren sighed.

“Are you,” Hux said slowly, “feeling any better, Ren?”

“Ah, yes. I am a bit.” He shivered, and Hux’s eyes softened more.

Hux returned to the bed and began gathering up the ice packs. He took them to the tub and carelessly threw them in there to be collected later by a droid, or by Ren himself, if he felt better. Ren loathed even droids in his private oasis from the rest of the Order

“Shall we change the sheets, Ren”?

“Mm?  No, no. They feel good.”

His eyes flicked to Hux.

“Come here.”

Hux obeyed immediately. He knew he shouldn’t have. He knew he should order the sheets changed and medical personnel to observe Ren. He knew he should leave.

He slotted into place perfectly beside Ren; holding Ren, pulling that great dark head to his shoulder, about which Ren always complained because it was too hard. But he kept his head there anyway.

For his part, Ren turned to face the Grand Marshal, hiding his face in the crook of that soft, slim neck. Hux combed his fingers through Ren’s tangled hair and murmured to him. Nothing really pertinent at all, just gentle words. Hux’s voice was oddly sweet; he sounded nothing like the proper, regimented military officer his troops knew. He sounded as if he were speaking, wistfully, to Ren in a way he wished someone would speak to him. It almost made Ren want to cry, if he were capable of weeping for Hux. Brutal, cruel, beautiful, like some prince of some forgotten ice world. But now, Ren could sense it, coming apart at the seams because of something so uncharacteristically weak as love.

Hux checked in on him again. As he pulled away, Ren grumbled; but Hux only touched his unscarred cheek.

“How are you feeling now?”

“Better,” he mumbled again.

“Still warm. Would kyber work?”

“What? Maybe. Probably. Please don’t talk about that right now. I’m too exhausted. I leave it to you, Grand Marshal.” Ren pulled out Hux’s title to distance himself, to focus, and he felt Hux tense, sigh to himself.

“All right, Ren.”

They lay like that for some time, Ren dropping in and out of hazy, disconsolate sleep. Only Hux grounded him. Only Hux kept him tethered here. He still felt as though the Force were waiting to pull him away. The mountain. The lonely tree. It was calling to him, saying his name and yet it wasn’t his name…

Hux held him tightly, refusing to give him up to the Force, either side of it.

Once, when he thought Ren asleep, Hux began to speak to him quietly. Too honestly. He continued stroking Ren’s hair and nuzzled his brow as he whispered to him, though he could still feel the overwhelming tension of the Force still teeming around Ren. Perhaps he wished to challenge it. A duel to the death for Ren’s life, he thought grimly.

And so, he continued.

“Do you really want this, Ren?” he whispered into Ren’s hair. “This life, this cruelty? What did you wish to be as a boy, long ago?”

He felt something coil around them. It was invisible, but he could sense it. It was like Snoke but it was not Snoke. It was like Ren and maybe it was Ren. But it also was not Ren. It was the Force. The Darkness. It was strong. So possessive.

Hux thought Ren was asleep, and Ren chose not to disabuse him of this notion. He couldn’t help but listen to Hux and ignore the insistent Force.

“Did you want to be a pilot, Ren, or a smuggler? Would you have liked to be the prince that you are?” Hux kissed his brow. “I would love to see that. How beautiful you would look.”

Ren felt Hux’s smile against his forehead. He nestled more closely to his grand marshal. Hux’s soft sigh tickled against his face.

“I do love you. This is certainly a problem, Ren.”

Ren kept his body from tensing, from throwing Hux out of his bed. He had promised, after all, and Hux had not promised to never confess his love. He did it more than he should, and he should never say it at all. As if it would change things, change Ren’s mind. Of course, it wouldn’t! And anyway, Ren doubted Hux comprehended love. It was a weak thing, painful, and only fools indulged. Ren felt heat burning through his skin again, and quite suddenly.

Hux hissed and wrenched his leg up. Ren started.

“What is it?” he asked.

Hux’s eyes were wide, his breath coming in fast little pants.

“I don’t know. There’s nothing there, but something definitely grabbed my foot.”

Ren concentrated.

“There it is again!” Hux yelped. “It feels as though something is examining me.” He put his leg back down on the bed and kept very still.

Ren opened his eyes. He could sense the Force curling itself around Hux’s leg, crawling up his body, indeed examining him. It was happening again. Ren was losing control of his powers. As had happened so many times before during the childhood of that unfortunate, wretched boy, Ben Solo.

“It’s testing you. Don’t move,” Ren murmured. Hux nodded his acknowledgement.

Ren closed his eyes again. He stayed silent and still so long that Hux became worried. But gradually, he felt the curious tendrils of the Force release him. He relaxed back into the bed and rubbed his fingers along Ren’s arm, connecting the freckles and moles and scars, constellations of his rare beauty.

At last, Ren came back to him with a shudder.

“There. Should leave you be now,” he said.

“What does it want?”

To examine you, like you said. To see what manner of creature tries to distract me from my bond with the Dark Side.”

“Manner of creature—”

Ren shrugged. “I need water.”

“I’ll get it, Ren.”

“No, I need to stand up and stretch. Just wait here. I’ll be back.”

Ren stumbled from the bed, shrugging off Hux’s attempt to help him, and made his way stiffly to the refresher.

Ren held onto the sink and stared at his reflection. He looked worse than usual. His lopsided features seemed to have melted from his own heat. The remains of sweat stood out against his hairline, and his mouth was slack. He trembled almost imperceptibly, but it was difficult to stand nonetheless. Closing his eyes with a disgusted grunt, he stuck his mouth to the tap, turned it on and drank. When he was done, he splashed his face with cold water.

He didn’t want to look at himself in the mirror anymore. He didn’t want to face Hux. So he faced himself. But a moment.

How could Hux possibly think he was beautiful? He’d said it so many times. As he studied his face, he thought back to the first time Hux had ever seen his face. How Hux had looked at him in awe—before the scar—and kissed him, their lips sweet from plum wine.

And still, even with this scar, Hux told him he was beautiful. Hux touched his torn cheek gently, almost reverently, if they kissed or fucked. And Ren could read him well enough—Force or no—to know that he was completely in earnest.

The absurdity of it. And Hux, so ignorant of his own beauty. The Grand Marshall knew people desired him, but he didn’t believe in his own loveliness. Ren thought that absurd, plainly, simply.

But he couldn’t let himself be distracted, not any longer. Especially when he needed to be ready to fight. Especially when he couldn’t afford to focus on long, slim pale legs around his waist; delicate wrists held in his hands; luscious pink lips against his own.

It was lust. And loneliness. Ren knew this. It pissed him off. Especially since Hux thought it was real.

It wasn’t.

Ren caught his own uncertain, wary eye in the mirror.

He glowered. It wasn’t real.

He limped from his fresher.

And yelled out as he caught sight of Hux in his bed.

Hux, who was bent in half backwards upon himself, his spine curving, his head below his posterior.

“Hux! Hux!”

“R-Ren” Hux gasped, barely able to take a breath for the awkward—to say the least—position. As Ren watched, Hux’s body twisted to the side, and his arms bent back toward the pillows. He was almost in a writhing serpentine shape. But his face remained strangely calm.

“What is this? What happened?”

“I think—I think it’s the Force? When you left, I could… feel it… touching me, grabbing me—it’s not hurting me, it’s just—” Hux paused to gasp for air.

“It’s just warning you!”

Ren scrambled onto the bed and gently took Hux in his hands.

“Stop it, stop it,” Ren demanded. “You can’t touch him. You can’t have him!”

Whatever Ren was doing, Hux felt the grip of the Force retreat as Ren struggled against it. Slowly, Ren’s anger coerced the Force into releasing Hux—first his arms, then his neck and spine, until Ren managed to gingerly straighten him out on the bed.

Ren gathered Hux’s limp exhausted body to himself. “He’s mine,” Ren growled. “He’s mine, you hear? Do not touch him again. I belong to the Dark Side, fully and absolutely. But he belongs to me.”

Hux felt the Force retreat from him fully, petulantly almost, if the Dark Side could behave that way; he didn’t know.

He breathed deeply and reached out to cling to Ren.

Now, the fear took hold. Now, he could believe in the power of the Force. It had touched him of its own volition. It had taken initiative. This was dangerous. How could he leave Ren to the Dark Side? He could not. Inadvertently had the Dark Side declared war. And Hux would do all in his power to defeat it. Even if Ren were never his, Ren could at least be his own. This Armitage Hux swore.

Meanwhile, it was Ren’s turn to speak soothing words to Hux as they held each other tightly.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Hux,” he said. “This is why—why I can’t have feelings—why I can’t do any of this. You have to understand. I’m not like other people. I’m—”

Hux took Ren’s face in his hands. Examined its singular beauty. “I will find a way for you to control it. I’ll do everything I can to find a way. I am only yours, and the Force cannot take me from you, nor can it prevent me from giving you power over it. I belong only to you.

“You’re mine,” Ren growled.

Hux smiled as Ren captured his lips in a kiss.


	5. Down Falls the Sun

 

 

Hux lay curled against Ren’s side, absorbing his warmth. The stone Hux had given him lay in the valley of his breasts, and Hux rested his pale hand alongside it and Ren’s many scars. He stroked down Ren’s torso and huddled further against him as Ren curled his arm around Hux’s slim shoulders.

“Does this help?” Hux asked, raising the black stone on its silver chain.

“Mm, a bit, yeah. It’s been better.”

“It’s only a temporary fix, but I thought it better than just letting you suffer.”

Ren huffed.

“So concerned for me, Grand Marshal.”

Hux furrowed his brow and hid his head against Ren’s chest.

In his rooms, the only light came from the lights of distant stars rushing toward their deaths. Hux felt as though he were on a similar trajectory as those stars. Were he more sentimental, he’d mourn both those celestial lights and himself; they had offered him some of the only solace in his three and a half decades of life.

Ren, his Supreme Leader, his love—stars help him—his god offered precious little solace. Simultaneously, a release and a sorrow, this man—this great beautiful monster. He rubbed his cheek against Ren’s pectoral, inhaled his scent. He wished to memorize it, in case. If Ren left him or exiled him or killed him. He’d have this, at least. Didn’t scent hold powerful memories? If he were to die by Ren’s hand, at least Ren’s odor would remind him, in his last moments, of times like this: Hux’s hair mussed, curled into Ren’s body; the two of them holding each other tenderly, languid fucks after busy cycles.

“Don’t call me grand marshal when we’re naked in my bed,” Hux said with a dubiously successful attempt at flippancy.

“You’re thinking morbid thoughts while we’re naked in your bed,” Ren replied. When Hux raised his head with a frown, Ren added, “Your thoughts are loud.”

“Oh,” Hux mumbled and hid his face again.

“Don’t hide now. It makes it worse.”

“Makes what worse?”

“You know—how you feel. How you think you feel.”

“How I think I feel?” Hux repeated and sat up. His face flushed angrily at Ren’s implication, but it was too dark to see how charmingly pink Hux became. Ren could imagine it though and tried not to smirk.

“Yes. How you think—”

“How dare you. Don’t make light of me again.” Hux rose from the bed. “Don’t.”

Ren grabbed his arm before he could walk away and yanked him back onto the bed. He yelped as Ren flattened him into the mattress and rolled atop him.

Ren’s weight pushed down on him; he felt as if he could drown. He attempted a deeper breath than he was able.

“Don’t you know, Ren?” he breathed. “Don’t you understand? I’m so tempted to leave this all behind. My entire life, all I’ve worked for, all my life has meant—if I thought you’d say yes, I’d run away with you forever. Don’t you get it? I’m broken. I’d leave it all behind if you’d take me away.”

A tear escaped his right eye and made its precarious way down his pale cheek to his sideburn.

“Don’t you see? I mean it,” he whispered.

“You couldn’t leave this behind.”

“I could! I would if—”

“You can’t stop being leader of the First Order military any more than I can cease using my powers. You don’t know what you say,” Ren growled, his hot breath against Hux’s face, his lips.

Hux stretched up to kiss him, but Ren grasped his delicate wrists above his head and pinned him to the bed.

“Show me, then. What am I sensing from you?” Ren demanded.

And Hux cried out as Ren invaded his mind.

This wasn’t a recent fantasy. No old recycled dream, no experiment.

Hux sat in a chair, reading, by a fire. He wore a sweater, and a cat sat at his feet. He drank a mug of tea and seemed to wait for someone.

Nothing was visible in the dimness besides this particular room. All the other rooms were blurred out, as if a god hadn’t bothered to plan the little cabin in advance, and left the tale there until further planning.

On the mantel was a mask. Ren’s mask.

Hux looked strangely comfortable here, in this room a far cry from the Finalizer. The walls were dark wood with hints of indecipherable art on the wall. The chair looked soft and held his body protectively in its plush red cocoon.

The door opened.

Ren walked into the room. Hux looked up and smiled.

In this vision in Hux’s surely fevered mind, Ren approached the fireplace. He wore gloves, and he was covered in dirt. He held something out to Hux—a small red flower, roots and all. Perhaps to be replanted, but Hux didn’t know about such things.

And Ren—he smiled.

Ren saw himself in the vision looking so very happy, impossibly happy.

He tore from Hux’s mind with a howl. Hux cried out in agony.

“What is that? Why are you dreaming of Ben Solo? That happy creature wasn’t me!” Ren spat.

Hux’s eyes flew open.

“What are you talking about?”

“I hate him. I hate that dead boy. He was a piece of shit, and I killed him. You don’t want Kylo Ren. I should have known. You’re just like everyone else. You want Ben Solo back!”

“What the fuck? Ren! Ben Solo is nothing to me. I never knew him. Could you not see your mask on the mantel? I know only Ren. I love you. I want you.”

Ren loosened his grip on Hux’s wrists. He lowered himself so that he overlapped Hux’s body.

“How is that supposed to be me?”

“How is that me?” Hux replied. “I don’t know! Somehow, we’re happy. I don’t give a fuck about Ben Solo, beyond the fact that he’s part of what’s made you! You are whom I desire.”

Ren ran a hand across his face.

“Everyone always wanted some other version of me.” He gave a laugh. “Snoke just wanted Darth Vader’s grandson. My parents just wanted their son back. No one wants me, who I really am, who I’ve become.”

“I only know you. You’re what I want.” Hux whispered.

Ren leaned close to Hux, kissed him.

For one brief moment, Hux’s heart hurt with desperate hope. Ren would take him and flee the Order. They’d find somewhere like that little cabin and—

“We’re going to destroy that dream. I will burn that cabin to the ground.”

“What? No, Ren?”

“It’s a detriment, Hux. Nothing good will come of harboring such fantasies. They’ll destroy us both. All we’ve worked for. All we are.”

Hux looked at the man he loved with such hurt, such horror in his eyes, that Ren was taken aback. He pulled away from his grand marshal, grabbed his hand insistently.

“Yes, Armitage,” he said, but it wasn’t dispassionate or furious. Instead, it was cajoling, as though he were asking Hux to run away with him.

“Don’t use your power on me, Ren. No, I mean it!”

Ren scowled and retreated from Hux’s mind with a sharp pain. Tears formed in Hux’s eyes, now the gray-green of sorrow.

“Please let me keep this.”

“No. We need to destroy it. Affection has no place in what we are achieving. Let me destroy the cabin. Let me clear your mind.”

As Ren reached for him, Hux howled in agony. He covered his face as tears flowed down his cheeks. Again, Ren was nonplussed. He couldn’t understand why this fantasy, this delusion, meant so much to the man who had engineered a planet that destroyed five other planets. How the man who had perfected the Stormtrooper program could be so weak right now, in this bed.

Ren needed to end this.

“Give it to me, Hux,” he ordered.

Hux reached out a hand, as if to grasp it back from Ren.

“I won’t let you touch it,” Hux told him, “It’s mine.” His voice cracked, and he began to rise from the bed, but Ren caught him around the waist. “It’s mine, not yours!”

“Everything is mine, Hux,” Ren told him coldly. But he pulled the other man to his breast and stroked his bright hair.

Ren’s voice may have sounded cold, but his body betrayed him. It was warm, and his strong hands held Hux protectively.

And they stayed like that, in silence. Hux’s head resting on Ren’s chest. Ren stroking his hair. Each alone with his own thoughts. Hux’s breath gradually slowed down; his tears dried up.

“You can keep it,” said Ren. “Just don’t let it interfere with the Order. Or with us.”

Hux looked at him. Tears dried on his cheeks, made his skin itch.

“It won’t, Ren. Nothing does.”

 

 

**

 

And it hadn’t, not even now.

Hux watched the red lights flashing. In his daze, he could hear voices, see people rushing to and fro. Pryde scowled down at him and said something with a sneer before stalking away. He vaguely heard Peavey say, “At our current capacity, actually shooting them would be murder in the dark. We can’t get a reading on the Resistance and might hit our own.” He heard Pryde reply—something, he didn’t know what. He couldn’t lift his head just yet. Peavey looked afraid as his gaze shot down to Hux.

“The Grand Marshal, sir,” he said.

“Eh, he’s dead anyway,” Pryde responded.

Hux started at these words.

Not yet. Not yet.

Slowly, he began to rise, clutching at his shoulder.

“Sir!” Peavey cried. Strangely, he seemed concerned. Hux knew Peavey hated him, but he had always been strangely loyal. He staggered forward.

“The Supreme Leader—” he said hoarsely.

“Left the planet, sir. Fighting through the Resistance to rendezvous with the Finalizer. She’s been hit badly, sir.”

Hux closed his eyes. His ship probably wouldn’t make it through this. She’d end up like all the derelict star destroyers on Jakku, picked apart by scavengers just like that confounded Jedi girl.

The bridge rocked, and Peavey clutched Hux to keep the Grand Marshal upright. Hux was grimly pleased to see Pryde stagger and fall to his knees. He hoped the old fart broke one.

He saw the latest traitor, dead by Peavey’s own blaster, slide across the walkway and land on the floor below. To their credit, everyone else on the bridge kept their eyes to their screens, clutching at their banks of computers for balance as the ship rocked once more from a violent barrage of laser fire. This, he knew, was the end. He sighed.

He looked around at the pale, frightened faces of the people in his charge. He took a final, fond glance around the bridge of his ship; glimpsed out the viewport at the dogfight outside. He fancied he could see Ren’s command shuttle, its great wings spread and speeding home to him.

He closed his eyes and thought very hard.

Sorry, Ren. I’m done for.

He turned to his people.

“This is a direct order. The Finalizer will fall. Everyone get to the transports and head down to the planet. Either flee or surrender. But don’t let old men convince you to rebuild the Empire again. The galaxy just doesn’t want it anymore. You are all dismissed.”

Everyone stared at him blankly.

“Did you hear me?” he snapped. “The First Order is over. We’ve lost because of the Resistance’s damnable luck! Flee! Save yourselves!”

“Sir,” Peavey began.

“Do not,” Hux snarled, “question this order. It is your final one from your Grand Marshal. We have fallen because of traitors. We cannot survive this as an army. But all of you could survive if you flee now. Go, Captain. Thank you for your service.”

He saluted Peavey then, but no one moved. He yelled and shoved the older man toward the bridge entrance.

“Go, Eddrison! All of you!”

Peavey looked as though he were about to cry. He nodded and turned on his heel. Hux didn’t watch him leave. He went to the comm desk and gave the same order shipwide. Fleetwide.

Everyone run or surrender.

He knew the Resistance would take mercy on the troops, and probably be at least civilized in how they handled the officers. Better than the Order, he admitted to himself.

“What have you done?”

Hux had forgotten old Pryde.

“I’ve relieved everyone of their duty and probably saved their lives,” Hux replied as he turned around.

No surprise to him there was a blaster pointed at his face.

“Your work, I suppose?” Hux asked and gestured nonchalantly to the dead officer on the floor.

“I viewed it as necessary. High Command was none too pleased with your intimacy with Kylo Ren. The half he didn’t destroy thought it best to neutralize you. You’re the brains of the outfit.”

Hux grinned.

“You old men are why we never could succeeded. Bunch of grasping, arrogant old fucks. We could have done genuinely great things without all of you ruining it for all of us.”

“Oh, please. We’re why you lived, boy.”

Hux laughed.

“I lived on my own. None of you had anything to do with that, except maybe Brendol. If I could survive him, I could survive nearly anything”

His comm crackled and a voice shouted into the silence. “Sir, what is going on?”

Hux held up a finger casually. He found it almost comical that he paused this moment to respond to Opan. He knew Pryde would fire in a moment.

“Tritt, you are to take Millicent and Kayfour on to a transport and escape to the planet below. No arguing. Just go. Take care of my girl, and… thank you.”

He turned off his comm and threw it to the floor below the walkway.

“Now, where were we, old man?”

“Ungrateful brat.”

Hux shrugged. “Perhaps.”

Pryde fired.

The bolt of the blaster seemed to fly toward him in slow motion. It looked almost beautiful in the flash of the red emergency lights. His death, he thought, could be magical with such brilliant colors.

And then, without warning, the viewport crashed into the bridge. Before he was sucked into space with transparisteel shrapnel, Pryde saw a custom Upsilon-class ship fire at him, and then he knew nothing.

Hux’s fingers clutched at the bridge walkway, but as he lost consciousness and slipped into the ether he had one last thought:

I love you, Ren. Not Ben Solo, not the Supreme Leader. Just you. I’m sorry I couldn’t do a better job.

And then he knew nothing.

 

 

**

 

He remembered nothing.

Perhaps this is what death feels like. Remembering nothing. That would be fine, if he could have forgotten everything before nothing.

Maybe he was the villain of the story, after all. The First Order fallen. Everything gone. He and Ren failed. If he were the hero of even just his own life, maybe things would have worked. Maybe his means didn’t justify the end; even if the galaxy desired order, it apparently didn’t like the manner in which he sought to bring it.

More fool I, he thought as consciousness returned to him, his memory warming up in flashes:

He recalled being sucked into space, and then a floating nothingness. Freezing cold and then warmth and then wet. Wet for a long time. A gentle hand to his face.

He remembered in the soft, cool wet another dream, another fantasy came, as though mocking his downtrodden state.

He lay on a bed beneath a curtained window. Blankets up to his chin and sun slanting down to warm him. Millicent curled up beside him. He felt hazy, as if he’d just awakened.

“Hey,” a voice called softly.

“Hello,” Hux yawned and reached out.

To Ren, his Ren, but with a soft pleased smile on his face. He wore a simple shirt and pants in his preferred black, but he was barefoot, his sleeves rolled to the elbow.

Ren cocked an ear toward him and shook his head, but he still smiled.

Such a smile!

Maybe the galaxy didn’t despise him so fully, if it left him that final dream.

He whimpered as it faded.

And now death comes, he thought.

But the galaxy, the Force, was far crueler than he credited it.

Instead of the void of death, he woke on a dilapidated sofa. In a dilapidated room in a dilapidated house.

This was a cruel joke, surely.

He realized he’d been vaguely aware of his present state for a while. The bed was no dream. The wet wasn’t either. But a bacta tank and then escape to a dusty hovel.

With nothing to his name.

Not even himself.

More memories returned to him. Ren somehow getting him into his Upsilon. Watching Ren watching him through clouds of bacta. Ren feeding him gruel in bed for the past few days. Until now, when he’d managed to awaken and drag himself to the couch.

What was he doing here? Why did Ren bother to save him? He was a failure! He was fairly certain their cause was abolished. All their ships plummeted once again to backwater planets. He hoped his people had fled to safety or surrendered. His heart could take no more failure. He didn’t think he could abide obsolescence either, but it was an easier yoke than the one of knowledge of not only defeat but the utter annihilation of his people.

But what was he now? Who was he? He never got that far in all his quaint daydreams of himself and Ren in a cabin much nicer than the one in which he found himself presently.

Was there a knife? Could he end it?

He couldn’t even bring himself to look

The sun through the window mocked him with its cheerfulness.

Ren wasn’t here.

Hadn’t been for a few hours, perhaps.

Well, then, it seemed Ren also declared Hux obsolete, much as he himself had. A grand marshal with no military. A ruler with no people. A man with absolutely nothing, not even a datapad or a pencil and paper with which to explain to anybody who didn’t really care, only minded about the desiccated body hanging from—he looked up—the doorknob, he decided—why he’d done it.

If this was punishment for aforementioned failure, he didn’t feel like observing it. He would not condescend to be humiliated further or rendered even more irrelevant.

And if Ren didn’t want him, what was the point of living?

Millicent, a voice said. His own.

“Now, now, don’t be a coward, Armitage.” He ordered… himself, since there was no one else. “Millie can find a nice farmer or something. Wherever we are.”

She’s better off without me, he thought.

He thought, perhaps, he could be motivated enough to stand from this old couch and find a robe… a curtain… bedclothes. Anything, really.

His body refused, at the moment, to obey him, so he remained stuck in the fetal position. Like a babe.

He watched from the corner of his eye as a tear slid over the bridge of his nose to soak into the moldy cushion.

Suddenly, a cacophony of cries erupted from another room. Hux managed to peek around the arm of the aforementioned couch. There was Millicent. And three other very unfamiliar tails—a long black, a short black, and a very long striped one.

Where the kriff did those cats come from? He wondered. Interest perked up, though he tried to tamp it back down. Maybe, at least, the cats did need him. He could live for cats, alone with cats, their cold judgement so like his own, their affection too; yes, he and cats could get on well.

The thought died as it was born when he glimpsed someone else making needless amounts of noise in the kitchen: clattering preserved goods, slamming cupboards, stomping around. The jumble of hard food in bowls.

And then Ren appeared across the room in the entryway. And he was smiling, if Hux wasn’t mistaken.

Hux’s eyes widened.

“What is going on?” he asked.

“Hux!” Ren said. “You’re awake! Can’t hear!” Ren was yelling and his voice sounded strange.

“Ren!” Hux cried out, his voice sounding hoarse and brittle due to many days of disuse. “Where are we? Why are you yelling?”

“Hux!” Ren yelled again. He sat down on the couch beside Hux and covered Hux’s hand with his own. He looked into Hux’s eyes. Hux blinked. He was baffled, overwhelmed. Those eyes… He was drowning in them. How was any of this possible? It couldn’t be real, could it? 

“Ren!” he cried again, his voice anguished. “I’m so sorry. I failed.”

Ren did not answer. Instead, he picked up a small laptop computer from the floor. The thing looked like an antique, something pulled out of a junkyard. Ren placed it on his lap, and motioned for Hux to look. There was a message typed on the screen.

“Armitage,” the message read. “I came for you. I knew I could rescue you and kill Pryde. However, I had no choice but to risk firing on the bridge. I’m sorry. It almost killed you,”

“What?” Hux said, his eyes scanning the message.

“But even facing the girl,” the message continued. “I could sense your despair. I came for you. You were more important than defeating her.”

“You ran from battle to save me?” Hux said. “Why?”

Ren did not answer. He motioned for Hux to keep reading.

“What I defeated” Hux read, “was something else, someone else, controlling even Snoke. But I fought it and destroyed it. It was very powerful and it took a lot out of me. I thought I was dead for sure. I didn’t die, obviously, but I may not be able to use the Force again for a while.”

Hux looked up from the message, stared intently at Ren. What was he talking about? Was Ren hurt? He searched Ren’s face, but those soulful eyes offered no answers. Hux looked back at the screen.

“He tried to take me from you. To control me. That was always the plan. But I won. I banished him to hell, I hope. But his final revenge was—I don’t know how to describe it—except to say that it was a horrible scream. My eardrums exploded. It hurt. I thought I’d die from it all, but I knew I had to destroy him, if I wanted to be here. For you.”

“I don’t understand,” Hux whispered.

Ren shook his head. He began typing on the old computer and Hux read along.

“I can’t hear anymore,” he typed. “But we’re alive. Palpatine couldn’t kill me. I had to come back for you, Armitage.

Ren couldn’t hear; he defeated the old, dead emperor; he deserted a battlefield—so many things confronting him. He could barely comprehend what Ren was telling him.

He shook his head, terribly confused.

“I was a fool,” Ren typed. “I’m so sorry.”

Hux leaned in closer. Ren met him and kissed him gently, reached up to stroke his face. And Hux touched Ren, his beauty, the only man he’d ever loved. The one for whom he’d have given up even himself—seemed he had.

This couldn’t be real. He must be dreaming.

Ren kissed the palm of his hand, so pale and delicate without its glove.

“I love you,” Ren said, his voice loud.

Hux burst into tears. Ren wiped at the tears with his thumb. Kissed the corners of Hux’s eyes from whence the tears flowed. He quickly typed another message:

“This is real. Always has been. You were the one of us smart enough to say it.”

And Ren closed the computer, and gathered Hux in his arms.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love it when our boys get a happy ending! Thank you so much for reading! Thank you for all the kudos and comments!


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